Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to content browsing in the World Wide Web and more particularly to managing unreachable Web sites during content browsing.
Description of the Related Art
The advent of the global Internet has facilitated access to an unimaginable quantity of information to even the most casual end user. Concurrently with the development of the Internet, developers have produced several content retrieval systems, most famously the world wide web (the “Web”). In the Web, just as in other content retrieval systems, content is stored in different content servers and retrieved into a content browser upon specifying a network location of the content within the content browser. Initially unique to the Web, however, was the notion of hyperlinking in which content pages incorporate activatable references—namely hyperlinks—such that the selection of a hyperlink in one content page led to the loading and display in the content browser of the content referenced by the hyperlink.
Content browsing ordinarily involves the end user providing to the content browser a uniform resource locator (“URL”) or other identifier for a network accessible resource with which the resource may be retrieved. Thereafter, the content browser issues a request according to the hypertext transfer protocol (“HTTP”) to a content server designated by the URL so as to retrieve the resource—typically a Web page. The response to the request that includes the requested resource is then provided by the content server to the content browser so that the content browser can render in the resource for viewing in the content browser. Of note, on occasion, the requested resource cannot be located by the content server. In that instance, according to HTTP a resource not found error code is returned to the content browser.
The basic interaction of the content server and content browser generally presumes that the content server is able to ascertain whether or not a requested resource may be located by the content server. In consequence, the response by the content server can be interpreted by the content browser as to the state of availability of the requested resource. However, it is often the circumstance that network connectivity to the content server lapses inhibiting the ability of the content server to receive the request from the content browser, to provide a response to the request to the content browser or both. It is also often the circumstance that the content server itself may suffer a fault inhibiting its operation. In those circumstances, the content browser only receives notice that the ability to contact the content server is unreachable.
When a content server is reported unreachable, the end user typically is not certain as to the reason the content server cannot be reached. Many possible factors come to play, some of which are localized to the end user. In this regard, the end user often does not know for certain whether the problem lies with the network or the content server, or whether the problem lies with the computer or supporting software of the end user. To facilitate troubleshooting of an unreachable content server, some Web based services exist which allow an end user to test the reachability of a particular content server without regard to the computing infrastructure of the end user. Indeed, such services report the reachability of popular Web sites based upon the queries of the public at large.